Where’s wal­laby? In Pukerua Bay

A dead wal­laby found on the side of the road in Pukerua Bay has re­gional coun­cil staff scratch­ing their heads and ask­ing the pub­lic if they’ve seen any more of the crit­ters hop­ping about.

The only known pop­u­la­tions of wal­la­bies in New Zealand are found in Bay of Plenty, South Can­ter­bury and Kawau Is­land – a long leap from Welling­ton.

A lo­cal man found the cu­ri­ous road kill on Haunui Rd, Pukerua Bay, on Novem­ber 12.

The wal­laby was later buried in an­other res­i­dent’s gar­den, but not be­fore a pic­ture was taken and emailed to Greater Welling­ton’s pest an­i­mal team on De­cem­ber 3.

A staff mem­ber from En­vi­ron­ment Bay of Plenty iden­ti­fied it as a Dama wal­laby – the type found in Bay of Plenty.

Greater Welling­ton biose­cu­rity man­ager Da­vor Be­jakovich said wal­la­bies are re­garded as an agri­cul­tural and en­vi­ron­men­tal pest in New Zealand.

‘‘[We are] very in­ter­ested to find out how it got there or if there are any more out there.’’

He said the wal­laby may have been a pet or been picked up as road kill from Bay of Plenty and put on the road as a prank.

‘‘ We’re not in­ter­ested in pros­e­cut­ing any­one for il­le­gally mov- ing a pest an­i­mal around the coun­try. [But] any in­for­ma­tion about how this wal­laby got to Pukerua Bay would be ap­pre­ci­ated.

‘‘If we can, we want to rule out that there might be a pop­u­la­tion of them some­where close by.’’

Dis­cus­sions with farm­ers around Pukerua Bay have not turned up any signs or sight­ings, he said.